Miami lawyer Gabrielle D’Alemberte, who represents five U.S. citizens suing in Florida, explains some of the drawbacks about trying to sue in Italy. She is quoted in the article explaining that Italy does not allow attorneys to work on a contingency fee basis in which the lawyer’s fee comes out of any settlement or verdict. She also states that compensation for pain and suffering and emotional distress are harder if not impossible to collect in Italy. “This was traumatizing at every level . . . That’s a cause of action in this country. It’s not in Italy.”

I would like to see all of the passengers and crew members obtain great success suing both Costa and Carnival here in the U.S. Costa’s settlement offer of less than $15,000 is a joke, but I think that prospect of suing in Italy will be prohibitively expensive and time consuming and the outcome uncertain.. I think ultimately the cases here in the U.S. will be kicked out of court.

I hope I’m wrong but I don’t think I am. You can read my thoughts about the prospects of successfully keeping the cases here in the U.S.in the article here.

The Washington Post covered the story and included the video interview of lawyer D’Alemberte, as well as Miami attorney Robert Peltz below:

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Cruise ship accidents, injuries, crimes, disappearances, fires, and collisions on the high seas involve issues of maritime law. Jim Walker graduated from law school in 1983 and has been handling maritime law cases for the past thirty-five years. He handles a wide variety of cases from serious injuries to the highest profile sexual assault and cruise crime cases.